My Life in Travel

Tag Archives: bump

Let me preface this rant with my disclaimer that hopefully will keep the Mummy/Mommy hate mail from coming my way and hopefully lead more to an ‘amen sister’ at the end of this….

I love my unborn daughter – she’s a 2 year project where I would be told I couldn’t get pregnant, my Husband and I suffered multiple heart breaking and physically awful miscarriages (for the most part – other than a few close friends and family, in silence – because you don’t talk about those things) and was told pretty much it wouldn’t ever happen….. so I/we 100% cried tears of joy last November to see that little smiley face on the pregnancy pee stick.

Making a human is absolutely incredible. The way your body just does it’s thing to nurture something from the size of a poppy seed to a 6+ lb baby astonishes me.

I cannot wait to hold her in my arms and to watch my amazing husband become a father. Just the thought alone is causing me to shed a hormonally charged tear just writing this.

I’m happy to become a mother. I believe in the miracle of baby making and I feel lucky and dare I say it, blessed to be able to conceive.

However, here’s where I’m going to get to my point….

In the last 24 hours alone I have experienced (a kind way of saying it) the following pregnancy related ‘joys’:

1) nausea
2) hot sweats
3) cold sweats
4) dizziness/feeling that I may pass out talking to people in a business setting
5) incredible heart burn followed by
6) incredible belching (or the other end if bystanders and I are not lucky)
7) congestion so bad that it causes
8) horrendous snoring that could cause divorce.
9) extreme tiredness which is made worse by
10) inability to stay asleep more than 2 hours at a time
11) baby kicks to lungs that feel like you are a personal punch bag that are at best distracting.
12) baby kicks so hard during the night you can’t stay asleep.
13) skin so stretched and warm that it’s itchy. Everywhere. All over – think mosquito bites and skin al fuego – remedy… none!
14) bodily fluid issues I won’t mention but you can google them (note to self: delete all search history when pregnant from work devices – that crap is embarrassing)
15) round ligament pain – commonly known as holy crap shooting cramps in your sides around the baby.
16) Kim Kardashian contenders for swollen puffy feet – mostly resembling sharpei puppies strapped to what were once identifiable as my ankles. (Oh how I miss my heels. Or any shoe not a flip flop)

The infamous Kardashian feet

17) the ravenous desire to eat followed by
18) once food is provided – no desire to eat whatsoever.
19) Breast pain that makes you want to squeeze like crazy. But of course you can’t. You’re in a meeting silly. You can’t grab your boobs in a meeting.
20) being so rotund and massive you cannot get yourself out of bed or a comfy seat in any glamorous, classy way or sometimes at all.
21) diaphragm and lungs so squished by growing bundle of joy that climbing stairs, walking or merely laying down leaves you out of breath or feeling like an elephant is sitting on you.

And lastly but by no means least:

22) my personal pregnancy favourite – waking up in the night unable to breathe because stomach acid has risen while you sleep and found it’s way in to your breathing pipe and you are choking yourself to potential death and flailing around in bed gasping for oxygen, trying to sit up but you can’t (see #20) and panicking that this is your final living moment. Fat. Pregnant. Sleep deprived. Cranky and a beached whale. Can you easily get back to sleep after this happens? F no. (See #9 & #10)

Reminder: That is in the last 24 hours alone. There’s more. I’ve just been fortunate to only deal with the other stuff in that time period.

So yes …. As people have told me – I wanted a baby, carrying a baby is a miracle, a blessing and all that jazz – I agree – whole heatedly. Third trimester pregnancy blows. And I’m not ashamed to admit it. And I am done feeling shamed to say I’m not enjoying it and that I feel great. There is an underground movement of pregnant women who all feel the same way but it’s so taboo no one says it out loud. I’m saying it out loud. I’d shout it from a roof top if only I had the energy and lung capacity to climb to a roof top.

I’m sure there are women who have wonderful easy pregnancies. But I am not one and I’m no longer going to smile sweetly with my pregnancy ‘glow’ and say it’s all A-OK. Cos it really sucks there’s no get out of jail free card. There’s no “ok I’m done” quitter option. This is the real deal. And not just til she arrives but the rest of my life. I’m going to need that village they say it takes to raise a child.

My mother has many times said to me “one day, when you are a mother you will understand” teenage me rolled my eyes. 30 something me says “Mummy you were right – please help”

Time to go. It’s 4am. I’ve been awake since 2am and need to rebuild my pillow fortress. Pee. And I’m suddenly starving….